


combination tone

by hanktalkin



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Established Relationship, Fluff, Nonverbal Communication, Other, Singing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-28
Updated: 2018-01-28
Packaged: 2019-03-10 11:20:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 800
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13500742
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hanktalkin/pseuds/hanktalkin
Summary: Omnics don’t talk to each other using words, exactly.





	combination tone

“What…does it do?” Zarya turned the band over in her hands, rubbing a thumb along the hard plastic. It was apparently some sort of headset, but obviously not meant for sound—what with its missing earpieces and substitutional trifecta of black disks.

“In short,” Lynx said, watching her experimentally test the durability of the headset in strong hands, “it’s a telephone.”

Zarya raised her eyebrow. “You are leaving your explanation intentionally vague so I will ask ‘what do you mean?’ and you will get to feel smart about yourself. Yes?”

Their voice held no inflection when they pressed a hand to their chest and said, “Zaryanova. You wound me.”

Zarya smirked. “I could if you like.” But the words had no bite, instead ringing of a different time when Zarya couldn’t imagine how far hurting this omnic would be from her mind. “Come now. Tell me why you give me this.”

“Fine,” Lynx relented. “Omnics don’t speak to one another, not in the way humans do. Instead we have…you know how Wi-Fi works, yes?”

“Lynx, I am human, not eighty.”

“Of course.” They gently waved their hand. “So it’s a series of small connections, little pings that are faster and yet richer than communicating verbally. It is not without nuance, however. This device was built as a translator, so even without the proper equipment, a human can “feel” an omnic speaking with them.” They cocked their head. “Would you like to try it?”

Zarya still didn’t quite get the purpose of it, but she nodded all the same. Carefully, Lynx withdrew the headset from her hands and tucked it onto her head, strands of pink hair popping out from the band like they were folding under a crown. She could briefly feel the tips of Lynx’s fingertips against her temples, the metal not as cool as she’d once expected.

“There,” Lynx amended, adjusting it so the plastic disks pressed against her scalp. “I’ll turn it on, let me know if you feel anything.”

And then they both just stood there. And blinked. Well, Zarya blinked, looking down at the omnic from her impressive height advantage. Sometimes, with the lack of a face, it was difficult to tell if Lynx had actually stopped moving at times, and she often found herself wondering if there was a little hourglass mouse-cursor spinning fruitfully in their mind every time they had to think about something. But as long as she’d known them, they’d never actually “crashed.” (Unless the time they’d been hacked by an international, toe-shoe wearing menace counted, but Zarya thought leniency could be played on that one.) So she waited patiently, several minutes just staring at her partner while the disks grew warm on her temples.

“Wait…” she said suddenly. “I think I feel…”

It started small. There was a gentle buzz at the back of her consciousness, like she could hear her phone going off but it was always behind her no matter which way she turned. Then it grew stronger— _louder_ —and was joined by other thrums and vibrations.

“…Robot noises?”

Lynx chuckled. “It translates the signals into sensations that a human mind can process. Otherwise it’d just be a series of electric messages your brain wouldn’t know what to do with.”

As Zarya “listened,” she began to pick apart the signals, recognizing a rhythm to them. Beyond that she could decipher nothing, like having all the letters to a foreign language.

“What are you saying to me?” she asked, raising an eyebrow of suspicion. “It better not be something unsavory.”

Lynx looked up at her. Whether they were being a little shit or not, they seemed content to leave it to her imagination.

Gradually, Zarya’s hand drifted to Lynx’s shoulder as she lost herself in the sibilation. Her eyes drifted closed, each message beating a tattoo on her brain, the aggregate becoming one endless symphony.

She began to hum along.

“What are you doing?” Lynx asked her.

Cracking open her eyes a fraction, she said, “I am singing. The way it comes through…it sounds like music.”

The patterns of buzzes and hums seemed to beat in measures, refrains, laying over one another so much that a harmony formed of its own will. Zarya’s hum grew louder to match it.

 

> _“Баю-баю-баиньки,_  
>  _Купим сыну валенки._  
>  _Наденем на ноженъки,_  
>  _Пустим по дороженъке._  
>  _Будет наш сынок ходитъ,_  
>  _Новы валенки носитъ.”_

The old lullaby fell easily, and Zarya wondered how Lynx could have found a message to fit so well. Maybe they had picked it because they thought she’d know it—maybe it was her own mind that was trying to makes sense of something nonsensical.

But Zarya was content to let the mystery lie. Lynx wrapped their arms around her neck and she sand while the two of them swayed.


End file.
